There's A Man With a Gun Over There

Lately I've been seeing this on facebook and twitter...

I don't comment because I don't talk politics or religion.  I  have my opinions, I know what I believe.  No one is going to change my mind.  I'm not going to change someone else's mind.  If someone asks me, I'll tell them.  I'm not ashamed, but I don't like to argue.  I don't like confrontation.  I don't like to be told I'm stupid for believing something.  So I avoid those topics. 

But this sign is bothering me.  And every time I see it, I want to scream.  Because once again we're going to go down this road.  Ban all guns or hand them out at preschool graduation.  No one sees a middle ground.  No one is willing to compromise.  So the conservatives and the liberals will fight and yell on every news channel that will give them air time and in the end nothing will change.

You see the thing is...and this is a big epiphany on my part, so shhhhh, don't tell ANYONE because I don't want it to get out, because obviously I am way smarter than anyone else in this country...the guy that shot up a Kindergarten classroom, and the guy that killed a bunch of VA Tech students, and the boys that killed their classmates in Columbine?  They don't care which sign you hang up in front of your school.  I know, shocking that a person who has so little regard for human life would not pay attention to a sign!  It's amazing really!

Each and every person has the right to believe and speak and post whatever they want.  I may not agree with you, but I will defend that right for you.  But think about it.  A man, who is mentally unstable.  Who is already planning on taking his own life.  Who is willing to kill 26 people on a Friday morning.  Why would he care if guns are banned or if the teachers are armed?  It's not like we can go back in time and remove all guns from this country, or the world.  Guns exist and if a person wants a gun, he can get a gun.  If he can't get it legally here, he can get it illegally.  He can order illegal bullets off the Internet.

The gun fight...it's not the issue people.  Ban guns.  I don't care.  Sell more guns.  I don't care.  Because the people who are following the laws and being responsible are not the people who are causing these tragedies.  After Columbine, they blamed bullying.  After VA Tech, they blamed the school.  Now, I guess they're blaming video games in one corner, school security in another, and the lack of gun enforcement over there.

The bottom line is, these people that do this are not mentally okay.  They are not functioning people of society.  Do they know right from wrong?  I absolutely believe they do.  This man, and I don't know his name because I refuse to give him that fame, killed himself when he heard sirens.  A person who would do that, at that time, knows what he's doing.

But does he have the logical thinking to make it through the day?  Obviously not.  This is where our anger and our fight needs to land.  Recognize this earlier, help these people earlier, have a better alternative to prison for these people.  And in the meantime make our schools safer.  I don't care how much it costs.  Bullet proof glass...awesome.  Safe rooms...wonderful. 

Go ahead and take all the guns away.  Collect them.  Raid houses for them.  And next month, some lunatic will go into a school with a knife or explosives.  Or hand out guns to teachers.  Make them take down intruders and then you'll hear about stray bullets hitting kids.

The fight is not about guns and the longer we argue over it the more we allow the real issue to grow and fester until this happens again and then maybe we can find something else to blame.

Watch Me Mommy

Last night I felt drained: physically, emotionally, mentally.  It was the end to another busy weekend and I would have liked nothing more than to crawl into bed at 6:00. 

Monday morning and the idea of leaving my kids was weighing heavy on my mind.  For hours, I had pictured walking out Freddie's preschool door or waving to Ainsley's bus and the result was always the same...tears.

I would  have liked to pull them both on the couch, wrap us in a blanket, and stay there for days...or maybe just forever.


But, as so often happens, kids have their own agenda.  It was not snuggle time, it was show time.



Today I am thankful that my kids have energy that goes for days, even if mine can't keep up.  I'm blessed that I can wrap my arms around them, even when they wriggle away.  I'm lucky that I am the last one to wish them goodnight and the first to see them in the morning, even if it means way too little sleep.

Number Three

I sat there on the toilet puzzled.  Counting and recounting days.  Day 14.  No doubt, day 14.  So why was I seeing blood.  Twelve days early.

I stepped in the shower.  It's cancer.  I have cervical cancer or ovarian cancer or one of those cancers that never shows any signs and HOLY HELL I must make a doctor's appointment tomorrow.  I knew I shouldn't have waited on my annual, it was due a month ago.

And then...

What if it's not.  What if that pregnancy test I took two weeks ago was wrong.  What if my period wasn't a period.  What if the exhaustion isn't from the half marathon training.  Well, then I'm miscarrying.  In three pregnancies I've only bled once and it ended.  Just ended. 

I dry off and slip into yoga pants and a t-shirt.  I hand Clif $10 and send him to the store.  I stand in the kitchen waiting, googling "mid cycle bleeding," "cancer and bleeding," "bleeding while pregnant," "random female bleeding."  I come up with a million different scenarios.

I text my sister.  She's a nurse.  She doesn't know. 

Clif comes home and I take the test into the bathroom.

The positive sign appears before I can finish peeing.  I'm pregnant...but I'm not, I must be miscarrying.

Two weeks I've been pregnant.  Two weeks of caffeine and beer and sushi and over easy eggs.  Two weeks of running 5 and 7 and 11 miles.  Two weeks of crunches.  Two weeks...I'm pregnant, but I'm not.  I've done something wrong.

I have ultrasounds.

"Everything appears to be fine."
"This resembles a healthy 6 week fetus."
"I can see a slight flicker of a heartbeat, but I can't get a reading.  It's probably just too early."
"Right now, I see no blood around the fetus."

But the blood.  I was bleeding.  Bleeding in pregnancy is bad.  Very bad.  Tell me I won't miscarry, then I'll be excited.  Then I'll embrace this.

"Well, we can't say that exactly.  But we have no reason at this moment to believe you will lose this pregnancy."

So I wait.  I worry.  I know this is ending.  I won't be happy.  I won't get excited.  I won't tell anyone.

But I have to tell some people.  My sister, my mom, a friend I am spending a weekend at a winery with.  I have to tell them, because they'll know anyway.

They all say it will be fine.

But I'm sure it won't. 

So I don't get excited, I try to forget that I ever even saw that positive sign.  If I'm going to miscarry, it won't be like last time.  I won't be a wreck, because in my mind, I'm not even pregnant.  It's all a mind game anyway.  Miscarriage.  It's too early to feel it or know it.  You just fall in love with this idea and then poof, it's just gone.

I don't get excited when I can't keep my eyes open at 6 pm.  I don't get excited when I throw up my prenatal vitamins 3 nights in a row.  I don't get excited when I have to move the notch on my belt buckle.  I don't get excited when I see the first ultrasound, even though I can finally see the heartbeat.

I wait.  At 12 weeks I'll get excited.  We'll hear the heartbeat, then everything will be fine.

I am 12 weeks and 6 days when I'm sitting in the doctor's office waiting for my 12 week appointment.

There won't be a heartbeat.  I know there won't.  And then I'll miscarry and this will be over.

And then, just as that thought leaves my mind, a tiny little bubble deep in my pelvis.

Was that?

No.

Then another.

Yes, it was. 

You are there and you're telling me to stop worrying.

Be excited.